101 lines
2.3 KiB
Markdown
101 lines
2.3 KiB
Markdown
Social and Spiritual Corruption
|
|
|
|
# Chapter 4
|
|
1. Listen to this message, you cows of Bashan
|
|
who are on the hill of Samaria,
|
|
women who oppress the poor
|
|
and crush the needy,
|
|
who say to their husbands,
|
|
"Bring us something to drink."
|
|
|
|
2.
|
|
|
|
The Lord God has sworn by his holiness:
|
|
Look, the days are coming
|
|
when you will be taken away with hooks,
|
|
every last one of you with fishhooks.
|
|
|
|
3. You will go through breaches in the wall,
|
|
each woman straight ahead,
|
|
and you will be driven along toward Harmon.
|
|
|
|
This is the Lord's declaration.
|
|
|
|
4. Come to Bethel and rebel;
|
|
rebel even more at Gilgal!
|
|
Bring your sacrifices every morning,
|
|
your tenths every three days.
|
|
|
|
5. Offer leavened bread as a thanksgiving sacrifice,
|
|
and loudly proclaim your freewill offerings,
|
|
for that is what you Israelites love to do!
|
|
This is the declaration of the Lord God.
|
|
|
|
God's Discipline and Israel's Apostasy
|
|
|
|
|
|
6. I gave you absolutely nothing to eat in all your cities,
|
|
a shortage of food in all your communities,
|
|
yet you did not return to me.
|
|
|
|
This is the Lord's declaration.
|
|
|
|
7. I also withheld the rain from you
|
|
while there were still three months until harvest.
|
|
|
|
I sent rain on one city
|
|
but no rain on another.
|
|
|
|
One field received rain
|
|
while a field with no rain withered.
|
|
|
|
8. Two or three cities staggered
|
|
to another city to drink water
|
|
but were not satisfied,
|
|
yet you did not return to me.
|
|
|
|
This is the Lord's declaration.
|
|
|
|
9. I struck you with blight and mildew;
|
|
the locust devoured
|
|
your many gardens and vineyards,
|
|
your fig trees and olive trees,
|
|
yet you did not return to me.
|
|
|
|
This is the Lord's declaration.
|
|
|
|
10. I sent plagues like those of Egypt;
|
|
I killed your young men with the sword,
|
|
along with your captured horses.
|
|
|
|
I caused the stench of your camp
|
|
to fill your nostrils,
|
|
yet you did not return to me.
|
|
|
|
This is the Lord's declaration.
|
|
|
|
11. I overthrew some of you
|
|
as I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah,
|
|
and you were like a burning stick
|
|
snatched from a fire,
|
|
yet you did not return to me--
|
|
This is the Lord's declaration.
|
|
|
|
12. Therefore, Israel, that is what I will do to you,
|
|
and since I will do that to you,
|
|
Israel, prepare to meet your God!
|
|
|
|
13. He is here:
|
|
the one who forms the mountains,
|
|
creates the wind,
|
|
and reveals his thoughts to man,
|
|
the one who makes the dawn out of darkness
|
|
and strides on the heights of the earth.
|
|
|
|
|
|
The Lord, the God of Armies, is his name.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|